History

Read more about the article A Dream of Electric Mothers

A Dream of Electric Mothers

'Baba Yemi holds up his finger and flicks it once like it is a lever. “One final thing. Don’t worry too much about the details of your consultation. All of you will receive the same answers regardless of how you ask the question, as long as it is indeed the same question. In fact, we count on it. It’s a good control procedure, to see if there is any alternative or minority report of the consultation conclusion. I will manage the debriefing session once you are all done. Does anyone else have more queries?” he asks. I look around and catch an earnest look in Jibola’s eyes like he is about to ask a question of his own, perhaps something that could delay or derail this consultation session, but then he changes his mind and looks away. “Great. If there are no more questions, please follow me. I will make the connection.” Baba Yemi bows gently.'

Read more about the article The Algorithm

The Algorithm

"They called themselves the Gaia Accord. A group of elites and technocrats that pushed for global technocratic stewardship. Governments replaced by systems, presidents replaced by panels, parliaments by predictive models. The climate collapse had come faster than anyone expected, and in the aftermath of the Migration Years, the famines, the water wars, the pandemics that never ended, people were too tired to argue. That they controlled Lethal Autonomous Weapons through their monopoly over AI systems, meant arguing was futile anyway."

Read more about the article A Shadow in the Sun

A Shadow in the Sun

"Here we are. Six magnificent black rhinos, muscles rippling under thick, wrinkled hides – the first to tread this earth in more than a decade since the last beast died alone in a miserable British zoo. Granted, they’re all young still – mere babies, according to Theuns Theunissen, director of Houmoed Private Game Reserve. Dear god, I loathe that man with the power of a hundred suns going nova. He looks like he’s stepped out of one of those nature doccies on one of the major streaming services – all blond, with a tan out of a bottle, and his teeth so white they must’ve cost as much as a small car. Apparently, he’s eighty, but doesn’t look a day over forty. Amazing what money can do. Especially when it comes to scrubbing what he did to a young, upcoming influencer at a product launch five years ago."

Read more about the article Constellations on Water

Constellations on Water

"She smiles. It never gets old to her, the act of growing something for the first time. She remembers sprinkling the tiny dry seeds onto moist soil and leaving the planter, a rose-gold tin out in the sun. She wonders what the tin used to be, in its past life, a hundred years ago. What it was first filled with, all the things it’s carried and will carry in the future. For now, it carries fragile life." 

Read more about the article Quintessence, or the Nature of Fetters

Quintessence, or the Nature of Fetters

"With the backing of well-funded lobbyists, Pastor Usen and the Quintessence Foundation pushed for the Nigerian government to relax the legislation around the incorporation of new technology required to sustain soul chains  nationwide. Quintessence and Nigeria entered Public-Private Partnership that started with developing vast energy infrastructure, and this collaboration heralded a quantum leap in tech, unlike anything a country has ever experienced. Many called him a visionary, and with his leadership, the Quintessence Foundation commissioned QTSSMN1, the first of what we now call soul mines."